Five of the best: Heroic country gardens

The Mincher gardens surround a Georgian-style home. Photo / Supplied

1. Mincher
338 Coatesville Riverhead Highway, Coatesville

Old orchards, waterways, formal and informal planting surround a Georgian-style home in this delightful large rural garden surrounded by podocarp forest. Explore native walkways, a rhododendron walk and a traditional walled garden with gardener's cottage and Victorian-inspired glasshouses.

2. Brookgreen Park
15 Goldflats Lane, Coatesville

Brookgreen Park is a large, formal garden in a park setting with a topiary and a Monet-style bridge overlooking water lilies, plus areas of maples and hostas, clivias, a palm garden and potager. With tranquil water features in different parts of the garden, it makes for a relaxing time away from the pressures of city life.

3. Pinelee
21 Coatesville Heights, Coatesville

Pinelee country garden is surrounded by majestic pinaster pines, with mature garden plantings of a wide variety of native trees and shrubs. The garden also features a year-round display of rhododendrons - colour through all seasons.

4. A La Fois
31 Coatesville Heights, Coatesville

The owners have used and enhanced the existing land form of 2.4ha once covered in gorse and scrub. Judicious plantings of natives and exotics have been chosen for their form and foliage to create pleasing and interesting vistas.

5. Twin Lakes
83 Sunnyside Rd, Coatesville

A garden formed around a 2ha lake with waterlilies and exotic waterfowl. Unusual and ornamental borders around the house, with rock gardens, and a bog garden. A boardwalk gives a closer encounter with nature.